David Pauley shared his photo of the year for 2025 the other day. Scott Ferguson commented on that post that maybe more people could submit their photos of the year as part of a one shot story series. I think this is a great idea, so this post is both my submission, and an invite to submit your own.

First, my shot.

This was a hard shot to choose… mostly because most of my favourite photos from the year include members of my family. As I talk about in this video with my late friend John, I value the photos of my family above all others, but for this I wanted to choose a photo that other people might find intriguing too, or at very least aesthetically pleasing.

I hope this image is interesting to others, but really, it means a lot more to me than I suspect meets the eye for others. Only moments before it was taken, the dog had managed to get through a fence and chased a sheep – in case you aren’t a dog owner, or are unaware, this is not something to be taken lightly. Some farmers threaten to shoot dogs for chasing livestock, and that’s not to mention the stress it can cause the sheep! Not long after we found our way out of the mist on top of the hills. This turned into a wonderful moment of peace and calm that smoothed over the stress of the earlier incident. Unfortunately, that was soon shattered (literally) be my daughter dropping and smashing her phone, and then me then falling over and fracturing a rib.

Despite the stressful bits though, I look back and remember the day really positively. The whole experience and my feelings and memories when I look back at the image sort of sum up my life with my family too. It’s not always sunshine and happiness… in fact, there is quite often a fog of stress and frustration that permeates our daily lives and experiences together. But when I look back, without wanting to sound too cheesy, it’s the positive stuff I remember, with the stressful bits almost seeming comical and certainly insignificant by comparison. The light, so to speak, shines through the fog…

This is one of the wonderful things about photography for the photographer. Images tell stories, and sometimes those stories aren’t visible to others. To anyone else, this might be an intriguing image that possibly takes a moment to look at and understand what is going on. But to me, there is a whole other story that’s not visible that’s about dogs and sheep, and broken ribs, and family life… and even the enjoyment I get in shooting a Pentax Q7. Moreover though, it reminds that stress passes, and with hindsight, things are often not nearly as bad as they seemed in the moment.

The full story with more images from the day is here.

Next, your shot.

David has obviously already shared his image, as I have too. So now it’s your turn! If you are a contributor to the website, then please feel free to upload a one shot story talking about your favourite photo. If you can do this before the 19th of December, I will make sure they are all published, then sometime around the new year, I will make another post containing everyone’s photos. We can then have a little poll to decide who’s photo is everyone else’s favourite. If I am feeling generous around the time, I will then dig around in my film stock fridge and send the photographer who took the favourite photo a few rolls of film as a little prize.

A couple of terms of entry:

Obviously this is all pretty informal, and just a bit of fun. But, the photo needs to have been taken this year. Also, if you aren’t currently a contributor to the site, you’ll need to get in touch with me about participating first.

Let me know any questions below

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